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tv   CNN Newsroom  CNN  October 29, 2013 11:00am-1:01pm PDT

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kathleen sebelius, the secretary of health and human services, will be testifying before that panel. we'll get a preview from fred upton. at 6:00 p.m., we'll have special coverage, a special report on obama care. thanks very much for watching. "news room" with brooke baldwin continues right now. >> wolf, thank you. great to be with you. i'm brooke baldwin. we continue here today. the world wants answers. right now this congressional hearing is underway. when you look at some of these pictures, this wasn't too long ago, these protesters here in the back of this room. they're holding up signs as the head of the nsa and the president's top intelligence chief are both there to testify as anger and suspicion grow over accusations of widespread u.s. spying. the worst of it, tapping the phones of u.s. allies. >> we, all of us in the intelligence community, are very much aware that the recent
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unauthorized disclosures have raised concerns that you've alluded to, both here in congress and across the nation, about our intelligence activities. we know the public wants to understand how its intelligence community uses its special tools and authorities and to judge whether we can be trusted to use them appropriately. we believe we have been lawful and at the rigorous oversight we've operated under has been effective. >> here are a couple questions. these are the biggies. what did the president know? when did he know it and what specifically depends on who you ask. the senate intelligence committee chaired by diane feinstein, she says, we knew nothing, claiming they were kept in the dark about what the nsa was up to. but other officials say president obama or at least his white house staff knew all about it. the president while not admitting or denying anything, is trying to calm this diplomatic storm with the promise of a review. >> we give them policy
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direction, but what we've seen over the last several years is their capacities continue to develop and expand, and that's why i'm initiating a review to make sure that what they're able to do doesn't necessarily mean what they should be doing. i'm not here to talk about classified information. what i am confirming is the fact that we're undergoing a complete review of how our intelligence operates outside of the country. >> joining me now, bob bair. as we're listening to this hearing, we were hearing some references to 9/11, justifications for why the united states needs the nsa intelligence collection. so really, to you, as a former member of the intelligence community, what is fair game? >> fair game is listening in to our enemies. iran, china, russia, anybody who
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poses us internationally, we can't trust. listening into germany, that's going beyond the pale. it's unnecessary. i've listened to german conversations before in the past. we don't care about their internal politics. they're very cooperative on terrorism. if we really needed answers, the president can call up something like merkel and ask her, preferably not on a cell phone, and ask her what's going on. he'll get an answer. >> so did it surprise you to find out that the u.s. was tapping the personal cell phone of the german chancellor? >> it totally surprised me. systemically like this, the president clearly knew. this isn't something you keep from the president of the united states. listening in on one of his interlocker its, it's a no-no in the intelligence community. somebody in the white house knew, if not the president. why didn't the president say, why do we really need this stuff? is it worth the risk? i think we know now the answer is no. >> i know there are certain situations in which the
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president of the united states is intentionally, you know, kept out of the loop, but tapping the phones of good friends of the united states, world leaders here, do you buy this notion that the president did not know about it? >> no, absolutely not. every time in the cia we ran into a friend of the president or a contact even, we immediately called up the white house and said, hey, there's a crisscross of contacts here. same way with the secretary of state. called him up, say, we're listening in on so and so, beware. it was standard protocol. >> so where do we go from here? >> congress needs to get ahold of this. we need discipline in the intelligence community. we can't be listening into american reporters are. we can't be listening into the german chancellor and the rest of it. there are too many other things to do. we have to refocus the intelligence community. dangers abroad aren't going
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away. >> so what happens -- there have already been references to 9/11. heaven forbid there's a terrorist attack and people are crying foul over this spying when after something horrendous happens, then you have half the world saying, well, why didn't we know more? why weren't we tapping those phones? how do you respond to that? >> brooke, you're absolutely right. we cannot dispense what the national security agency -- i spent my entire career going after human sources. at the end of the day, it was the national security agency which kept us safe. let's don't damage this organization. let's just try to clean it up. >> bob baer, thank you very much. and the name marilyn tavenner may not ring a bell with anyone, but she's in the spotlight today. she's in charge of the agency that created the healthcare.gov website. the very same website that has been universally criticized and mocked ever since it went live.
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today's hearing started with "i'm sorry." >> we know that consumers are eager to purchase this coverage, and to the millions of americans who have attempted to use healthcare.gov to shop and enroll in healthcare coverage, i want to apologize to you that the website has not worked as well as it should. >> from there, marilyn tavenner offered a steady defense of the overall obama care program. the website will be fixed, she promised, and in the long run more americans will have better coverage. cnn investigations correspondent chris frakes joins me now from washington. chris, a couple questions for you from this hearing here. the hearing this morning clearly hit on the issues, the glitches, whatever you want to call it with the website. it also got into reports that obama care is causing a lot of people to lose the coverage they already have and that is something president obama always said would never happen. take a listen. >> if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor under the
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reform proposals we put forward. if you like your private health insurance plan, you can keep it. if you like the plan you have, you can keep it. if you like the doctor you have, you can keep your doctor too. we will keep this promise to the american people. if you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor, period. if you like your health care plan, you will be able to keep your health care plan, period. if you like your doctor, you'll be able to keep your doctor. if you like your health care plan, you'll be able to keep your health care plan. if you've got health insurance, you like your doctor, you like your plan, you can keep your doctor, you can keep your plan. >> so set me straight, chris. are people losing their current coverage or no? >> well, brooke, under obama care, all insurance policies must now include ten essential benefit categories. these are things like maternity care and prescription drug coverage. plans that don't meet that
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criteria need to change. at least three states are telling insurance companies they must discontinue plans that don't meet all the new coverage requirements. that's because it's so complicated to change some of these plans that the states are asking them to scrap them altogether. that means the president's promise that if people like their current plans, they'd be able to keep them, is being broken. >> so then what happens to these people? >> well, if you're in kentucky, virginia, or idaho and have a plan that doesn't meet obama care's requirements, insurers will discontinue your current plan and are expected to offer new plans that meet the new requirements. for some people, that could increase their premiums. for others who might qualify for a subsidy under obama care, it could be cheaper. either way, you're going to get a new plan. >> so let's use kentucky for an example. what happens there? >> about half of the roughly 600,000 people in the state's private insurance market will have their current insurance plan discontinued by the end of the year. and i talked with a state
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insurance department official who told me that the important thing for people to remember is that they can't compare their old plans to their new plans. because the new plans include things that have never been covered before. so that could leave many people confused and upset. afterall, the president said they could keep their current plans. >> chris, thank you. speaking of all this, jay carney was just asked about this. the white house daily briefing happeni happening. we're going to tell you what he says the president means by folks keeping their insurance. what's the real deal? that's next. the day we rescued riley was a truly amazing day. he was a matted mess in a small cage. so that was our first task, was getting him to wellness. without angie's list, i don't know if we could have found all the services we needed for our riley. from contractors and doctors to dog sitters and landscapers, you can find it all on angie's list. we found riley at the shelter, and found everything he needed at angie's list. join today at angieslist.com
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concerns. reports from various outlets saying obama care is causing people to lose their health insurance. it's something the president said time and time again would never happen. so here's a straight answer from jay carney. >> let's step back. if you are one of the 80% of the american people who receive insurance coverage through your employer or through medicaid or medicare or the veterans administration, this conversation doesn't apply to you. these reports do not apply to you. if you're one of the 15% of the american people who are uninsured entirely right now, this conversation does not apply to you. so what we're talking about here is the 5% in the country who currently purchase insurance on the individual market. that market has been like the wild west.
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it has been underregulated. it is this place where americans have most keenly felt the challenges posed by the insurance system in this country where, for example, insurers could deny you coverage if you have a pre-existing condition, or they could offer you coverage that in its fine print excluded benefits specifically related to your pre-existing condition. so if you are -- if you have hypertension or you're a cancer survivor, they could carve out coverage on those specific issues and give you a plan that would cover you on other things. they could also and did routinely change your plan or eliminate it altogether annually. they could throw you off. they could jack up your premiums. they could change your coverage. and one of the issues that the
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affordable care act was designed to address was the need to provide greater security to those americans who had no other option but to seek insurance on the individual market. >> so that is the official response from the white house. we still have a heck of a lot of questions on this. we're going to continue digging on this. so stay tuned. the rest of the show here as we have several guests to tackle specifically obama care. meantime, a carry-on bag confiscated at the montreal airport has sparked something of an international mystery. police say a man traveling to los angeles had this bag. it was full of hidden parts that could be used to make a bomb. the mysterious part, however, has to do with his background rather than what was actually inside the bag. cnn justice correspondent evan perez joins me now. so why? why are authorities, evan, honing in on this guy's past? >> reporter: well, brooke, this is a particularly strange one. this gentleman is 71 years old. his name is anthony piazza. it's an italian sounding name.
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apparently he emigrated to canada from iran in the 1970s. a few years later he changed his name. he was stopped by canadian authorities as he was trying to go through security to board a flight from montreal to los angeles on sunday. in some compartments, they found some strange items. what appeared to be some powder in a pen that at first they thought might be phosphorous. there was some wires and some ammunition. when he was first questioned about it, he said that someone had asked him to take this bag on board. so, you know, the authorities there were very suspicious. they shut down a section of the airport. a bunch of flights were delayed. there was a large police presence in his neighborhood in montreal. they did a lot of searches. so far they have not found any indication that there's a bomb plot here. there were no explosives inside of these devices or these items
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that he was carrying. so today it's still a bit of a mystery he was due in court today in montreal to face charges for mischief and a couple other charges that could get him up to ten years in prison. but apparently the hearing was delayed because he needs a new lawyer. we're no closer to sort of understanding what happened, what exactly caused him to be where he was, what he was trying to do with these items. again, he's 71 years old. u.s. authorities are telling me and reporters here at cnn that, you know, it doesn't look like it was a real bomb plot, but they're still mystified, brooke. >> okay. still the answer to why doesn't exist. evan perez, thank you very much. coming up -- >> my job is to get this up and running. >> the woman at the center of the obama care mess set to testify. who knew what and when. cnn investigates.
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a mystery inside two water treatment plants. crews find a woman's torso and the discoveries don't stop there. plus -- >> you're high right now? >> yes, sir. >> the teen admits to running over and killing a cyclist and his surreal confession is all caught on video. and talk about catching the stoke. stunning video of a surfer apparently breaking a world record. my name is mike and i quit smoking. chantix... it's a non-nicotine pill. i didn't want nicotine to give up nicotine. [ male announcer ] along with support, chantix (varenicline) is proven to help people quit smoking. [ mike ] when i was taking the chantix, it reduced the urge to smoke. [ male announcer ] some people had changes in behavior, thinking or mood, hostility, agitation, depressed mood and suicidal thoughts or actions while taking or after stopping chantix.
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prosecutors say she was the motivation for murder. and today the ex-mistress of dr. martin mcneill took the stand. mcneill is accused of drugging and drowning his wife back in 2007 to be with this woman. this walking in the courtroom is gypsy willis. it was a matter of days after his wife's death when mcneill introduced willis to his eight children, hiring her as the nanny. willis even attended michelle mcneill's funeral. although the two never married, willis and the doctor were engaged. prosecutors used this fake wedding of theirs as evidence against dr. martin mcneill. >> you and the defendant went to wyoming in early july of 2007, correct? >> i believe so. sounds about right. >> and the defendant proposed to
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you, officially. date on this? >> marriage date is listed as april 14th. >> of what year? >> 2007. >> what is the significance of april 14th of 2007? >> that is the day of the funeral. >> of whose funeral? >> michelle's. >> let's be clear. willis is not facing any charges in the death of mcneill's wife, which the defense maintains it
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was caused by natural causes. prosecutors cut a deal with her to get her to sit there and testify. she has been convicted of an unrelated crime. and how about this one today? this district court judge in texas is stepping down amid allegations she texted a prosecutor from the bench during a trial. elizabeth coker was the focus of judicial conduct commission investigations. this is back in march after a witness reported seeing something he called very unethical. according to that report, coker texted this secret message of advice to an assistant district attorney during a felony child abuse trial. that attorney, according to this report, then passed the judge's secret note to the prosecutor in the case. let's talk about this with cnn legal analyst sunny hostin. i'm no lawyer. i'm no judge. but i know this, this is not okay. am i right, sunny? >> you're absolutely right.
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wow. the judges that i appeared in front of certainly never helped me in this way or at all really. i think we should make it clear that this judge hasn't admitted to these allegations, but i do have in front of me, brooke, the state commission on judicial conduct's voluntary agreement, which she did sign, withdrawing from the bench, which is really a sweetheart deal, if, in fact, these allegations are true. it's something i've never heard of before. it outlines such outrageous behavior, including all the things you mentioned, like texting a prosecutor, giving a prosecutor tips as to how to win a child abuse case. actually, even meeting with jurors, you know, without attorneys while the jurors were deliberating. that is something, in my view -- i don't know if drew has ever heard of it, but it's just unprecedented. >> drew, give us the rules of communication or lack thereof between, you know, someone on the bench and an attorney. >> complete lack of communication. you cannot communicate by
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yourself without the other party being present. and you cannot communicate directly with jurors other than to have them all present and give them a general explanation of the law or guidance. i've been in contact with some of my colleagues in texas, criminal defense lawyers. i've been getting some amazing facts sent to my office of screen shots of the text messages that were sent from this judge to this lawyer. i've seen an affidavit today of a former juror in a murder case that said the judge came to her and other jurors and said, if you find the defendant guilty, i'll give the defendant probation. it's starting to surface. i think we need to put into context why they let her get away with no admission. that's because, according to my colleagues in texas, everybody's gearing up for all the habeas corpus, all the post-conviction relief. we're going see the defendants that have been convicted lining up with their lawyers for new trials to have their past
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convictions and possibly guilty pleas overturned. it is the beginning of a flood gate getting ready to open in texas. >> interesting. let me just read this. this is from elizabeth coker herself. she issued a statement to our affiliate. she said, the judicial commission made no findings or determination of facts in my voluntary resignation, and i have not admitted guilt, fault, or liability in my voluntary resignation. perhaps we will be seeing a review. others might be in hot water here. sunny and drew, thank you very much. coming up here on cnn, if you have kids, you may be thinking they spend a little too much time on the internet. so a new study says, you know what, you're right. new recommendations for just how much time kids should spend in front of the tv, on their cell phones. you'll want to hear this. that story is next. plus, in the leadup to the rollout of the affordable care act, president obama said if you
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like your insurance plan, keep it. that is not quite the case right now. so who in the administration knew what and when? cnn investigates. stay with me. you're watching cnn. [ male announcer ] it's simple physics... a body at rest tends to stay at rest... while a body in motion tends to stay in motion. staying active can actually ease arthritis symptoms. but if you have arthritis, staying active can be difficult. prescription celebrex can help relieve arthritis pain so your body can stay in motion. because just one 200mg celebrex a day can provide 24 hour relief for many with arthritis pain and inflammation. plus, in clinical studies, celebrex is proven to improve daily physical function so moving is easier. celebrex can be taken with or without food. and it's not a narcotic. you and your doctor should balance the benefits with the risks. all prescription nsaids, like celebrex, ibuprofen, naproxen and meloxicam have the same cardiovascular warning.
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this brave little girl screams for help and manages to break free from her kidnapper. now this all-out man hunt is
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underway in aurora. police say the 8-year-old girl was in her bedroom. this was overnight when this unknown man popped the window screen and snatched her out of her house. the girl kicked and screamed and managed to escape back toward her home. her cries woke up her father, who came running to her rescue. >> this young girl immediately cried out, immediately put up a fuss and a struggle. who knows if that might have saved her life. she was pulled out through the window, but she managed to escape. part of the reason for this press conference is to alert the entire denver metro area that this predator is on the loose. >> so this predator, take a look at this. this is the guy police are looking for. this is the sketch. they're offering $10,000 for his capture. that is actually the largest reward in the history of the aurora police department. okay. a major pediatrician's group is recommending two hours tops for
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kids, two hours screen time. that's tv, laptop, cell phone. two hours tops per day. i can hear it right now. your kids are going, lol, mom and dad. you know why? because they know as well as we know that the tech world is their world. this is their home turf. the author of the guidelines, they're being issued by the american academy of pediatrics, he's putting this bluntly. his advice to parents, read the quote with me. this is the 21st century, get with it. that's right, mom and dad. get with it. kelly wallace is a cnn digital correspondent. i should add, a mother of two kids, ages 6 and 7 1/2. so kelly, as a mom, let's cut to the chase. compared to their parents, the parents i know, no offense, guys, are digital amateurs. what do they need to know as parents now to be able to police what their kids are doing? >> i know. and i'm cracking up because i really did love that quote. you know, it is time, parents,
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to get with it. here's the thing, brooke. we don't have to become digital experts. for many of us, that's really intimidating. but we have to get with the program. we have to understand what our kids are doing. we have to learn a little bit, talk with them about what they're doing. if you don't understand it at all, talk to a friend, talk to teachers, talk to people in the community. you have to learn, because as you said, this is their world. we have to inhabit their world and help guide them. the only way we can do that is by knowing something about it. >> exactly. when you read through the guidance here of this study, it says two-thirds of kids have zero restrictions on media use at home. zero. goose egg. but we all know it's the one thing to issue rules to the kids. it is quite another to have to enforce them. and i've talked to parents in doing my homework on this today, they're like, brooke, it's world war iii if you try to curb their screen time. what is realistic, kelly? >> i know. i have to say, i was surprised
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by that statistic. two-thirds saying they have no rules at all, no boundaries at all when it comes to electronic devices. that number seems really high, and there does seem to be room for improvement. let's face it, brooke, parenting is hard. it's a whole lot easier to say, go ahead, johnny, do whatever you want. but is that really good for johnny? and i really think -- i've done stories, brooke. i've talked to parents who are rules such as phones go off at 9:00 p.m. no phones during meal time. once you reach your maximum data allotment, the phone is done. the kids don't love it -- >> does it work? >> yeah. i think the message is you have to be a parent, not your kid's bff. >> i'll take your word for it, mom. thank you very much, kelly wallace. i appreciate it. a top deputy in the uncomfortable spotlight today on capitol hill, but tomorrow it will be kathleen sebelius'
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person to testify before congress. fireworks are expected. the health and human services secretary has taken a ton of political heat for the troubled rollout of the obama care website. so our own joe johns has more on how secretary sebelius came to her current position. >> she's the target of jokes about the healthcare.gov website. >> unfortunately, the site was only designed to handle six users at a time. so if you're in a rush, consider using our low-res website with simpler fonts and graphics. >> but it's the more serious questions about the website's rollout that can put health and human services secretary kathleen sebelius on the spot. >> why didn't they bring their a-team in, in the first place? >> i can't tell you -- >> why are we seeing it three weeks now? >> sebelius told dr. sanjay gupta she expected more when the website went live october 1st. >> well, i was optimistic that things would go smoothly.
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>> but she couldn't have been further from the mark. sometimes it has seemed like she was digging a hole for herself, at a time when dozens of republicans were calling for her to step down. >> i didn't realize it wouldn't be operating before the launch. >> which has raised questions about her leadership and president obama's. how could they be in the dark about something so important to their legacy? >> i think we knew that if we had had another six months, we would probably test further, but i don't think anyone fully realized that both volume cause the some problems but volume also exposed some problems. >> sebelius will face more tough questions wednesday when she heads to capitol hill where she's likely to face a hostile audience. house republicans launching an in-depth investigation into the rollout of obama care have threatened to subpoena sebelius. so who is the secretary of
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health and human services anyway? the kansas democrat and former governor, she was never part of the white house inner circle. the president's second choice for hhs secretary, nominated after former senate leader tom daschle dropped out. but she helped to get president obama's signature accomplishment, obama care passed into law, just a handful of cabinet secretaries to stay on in the president's second term, and she's given no indication she's ready to leave the job. >> my job is to get this up and running are the way it should have been running on day one. it's the most important work i've ever done in my life. >> joe johns, cnn, washington. >> joe, thank you. coming up, the best video of the day, including this crazy story out of the florida. look at this. a clerk survives a shooting thanks to his cell phone. plus, surfers in search of the big one find this monster wave. find out where and how we'll know if it breaks a record, next. my asthma's under control.
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question, are you high? the answer to the question sealed the fate of a 19-year-old in florida. he had just hit 53-year-old forest flanagan as the father of three rode his bike along this road here. after hitting him, anthony moffa left him there to die, but he was followed. someone in a car witnessed the whole thing, eventually getting him to stop where he shot this video using just his cell phone. >> anthony, that's your pipe right there? >> yes. >> okay. and you were the one driving the car? >> yes, sir. >> you're high right now? >> yes, sir. >> how about that? so he was high on synthetic marijuana. highway patrol didn't have the roadside equipment to test him for it at the time, but this admission on this cell phone camera was enough to see him
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locked away. he has just begun a 30-month prison sentence. his license suspended for eight years. so you thought they had big waves in hawaii, right? well, the place to go for surfers in pursuit of the big one these days is portugal. what we're looking at here just might be a world record run by brazil's carlos brulet. gives me goose bumps just to watch it. that wave estimated at ten stories high. we're talking 100 feet. chad meyers, our guy for all things oceanography. i remember, it was two years ago we talked to the last guy who set this record here, which was considered unbreakable at the time. what is it about portugal? how are the waves so huge? >> same beach, same place, same canyon in the ground. underground, there's a canyon.
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think about taking the water that would come out of a fire hose but shoot it through a garden hose. you have a good stream of water there. well, you have all this water in a deep canyon. it gets pushed up toward the shore. the shore gets shallower, but the canyon gets skinnier as well. all that water just really propels itself upward. this was at least a 100-foot wave. it was rode yesterday. it was an amazing sight. they take jet skis and tow these guys. you can't catch up to this wave. they take jet skis. the jet skis move ahead. the guy here on the surfboard is holding a rope, like he's water skiing. then he lets go. he goes down the hill. let me show you the graphic i have. it might really give you an idea of why. you asked why this happened. the canyon itself starts in the atlantic very deep. then it rolls up. this water rolls right on up into this canyon. then you get to the shore and all of the sudden you get something significant. there you go. that's what the canyon looks
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like. one more shot here. i'm going to show you what's going on. you'll see -- it's not moving. that's okay. you imagine the canyon, the funneling effect of the water. >> i remember with garret mcnamara a couple years ago, that record 78 feet. how did they ultimately say, okay, this was 100 and "x" feet. >> here's the picture. this is the surfer. he's six feet. they just keep adding them up. they'll take multiple pictures, multiple angles and say, okay, there's six feet, there's six feet. how high is it? they think at least 100 feet on this one. >> i thought i was pretty cool for catching waves in costa rica. he has me beat. >> yeah, he beat greg brady too. >> good for him. chad meyers, thank you very much. coming up next, drones. drones are a major part of the united states offensive in the war against terrorism. but what happens when innocent people are targeted, injured,
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and even killed? lawmakers in washington got an earful today as victims of drone strikes testified on capitol hill. congressman al grayson heard many of those chilling details. he'll react to some of the stories heard today live with me next. my asthma's under control. i don't miss out... you sat out most of our game yesterday! asthma doesn't affect my job... you were out sick last week. my asthma doesn't bother my family... you coughed all through our date night! i hardly use my rescue inhaler at all. what did you say? how about - every day? coping with asthma isn't controlling it. test your level of control at asthma.com, then talk to your doctor. there may be more you could do for your asthma.
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missile falls from the sky killing a grandmother and nearly killing her two grandchildren, not because of what they did, but who they were possibly near. that's the tragedy that lawmakers heard today in this unprecedented meeting here on capitol hill. for the very first time, member of congress heard from two reported survivors of a drone attack in pakistan one year ago this week. these survivors, and here they are, these are children of a primary schoolteacher whose story is featured in a documentary released tomorrow. it's called "unmanned: america's drone wars." a clip of that was played during
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today's briefing. then the boy and the girl described the day they say a drone nearly killed them. >> translator: everything was dark and i couldn't see anything, but i heard a scream. i don't know if it was my grandmother, but i couldn't see her. i was very scared and all i could think of doing was just run. i kept running, but i heard -- i felt something in my hand. i looked to my hand. there was blood. i tried to bandage my hand, but the blood kept coming. the blood wouldn't stop. >> translator: i no longer love blue skies. in fact, i now prefer gray skies. the drones do not fly when the skies are gray and for a short period of time, the mental tension and fear eases. >> representative alan grayson from florida invited that pakistani to the u.s. to come and speak. he joins me now from capitol hill. congressman, welcome. >> thank you. >> we hear -- you heard, members of congress heard from some of these drone strike victims.
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an incredibly unique perspective. you organized this briefing. what was your takeaway? >> my takeaway is we're undertaking something that's simply beyond anyone's capability, trying to decide on the basis of what we see on a computer screen in the united states who lives and who dies 8,000 miles away in a foreign land. it's inherently difficult. it's virtually impossible. and we're making many mistakes. there have already been as many as 200 children, children, who have died through these drone attacks in pakistan, afghanistan, and yemen. >> you know very well the argument for drone strikes. for the viewer, let me show a list cnn compiled of the top 20 terrorists killed in 2012. all killed by drones. the first one had a $1 million reward for his capture. then this perspective. this is a former adviser to be the pentagon. take a listen. >> so the question really for the united states is, how do we
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go after terrorists who hide in areas where we can't send in tanks, where we can't send in special forces, where we can't barrage the camps with artillery? so we've developed a very precise, very effective weapon that can take out terrorists before they plot attacks against us. >> congressman, how do you answer that question? what is the alternative? >> well, the alternative is to rely upon other countries to clean up their own messes instead of having us send our death equipment to the other side of the world to perform those acts for them. in this case, we're talking about pakistan. pakistan just received $1 billion in u.s. aid. in fact, pakistan receives about $1 billion in u.s. aid every single year, and pakistan is a 1 million man army. we're talking about capturing no more than 100 or 200 or 300 people. >> i have to jump in. we immediately think of osama bin laden. he was not taken out by a drone.
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can you really trust these other countries? >> the alternative is to see casualties that are staggering among innocent people. the 200 children i mentioned. all the estimates are that between 10% and 30% of the people whom we kill by drone attacks are completely innocent, including this grandmother in her 60s. >> i hear you, and i know that so much of this for you and so many others who i've talked to on this program say so much of this is about what's dubbed this phrase collateral damage, the killing of innocent civilians. but how much of this also is about the secrecy of this drone program? >> well, that's part of it. but i think people look at the pros without considering the cons. public opinion in pakistan is completely enflamed against us. we are losing the cooperation of an important regional ally because of these drone attacks. the same thing is true in yemen. same thing is true in many countries across the middle east and, in fact, around the world. the reason why we're killing these people is because we want to prevent them from taking
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action against the united states. but we're enflaming the opinions of millions of people against us when there are alternatives that don't require that, that are far more effective, less dangerous. >> i know that critics have called for some sort of, you know, judicial review or process, sort of a counter. i return to this family, these youngsters you brought from pakistan. do they have any legal recourse against the united states for what they say happened to them? >> well, that, of course, remains to be seen. but we are talking about a whole class of people who are killed upon the command of one man. generally speaking, it's god who decides who lives and dies, unless you're talking about drone attacks. >> congressman alan grayson, thank you so much. >> thank you very much. also on the hill today, just in to cnn, james clapper, the director of national intelligence answering a direct question about reports the administration spied on world leaders, allies, including the
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personal cell phone of germany's chancellor angela merkel. take a listen. >> it's one of the first things i learned in intel school in 1963. this is the fundamental given in the intelligence business. leadership intentions, no matter what level you're talking about. that can be military leaders as well. >> do you believe the allies have conducted or at any time any time of espionage activity against the united states of america, our intelligence services, our leaders or otherwise? >> absolutely. >> we will analyze this exchange at this hearing in just a matter of minutes. plus, forget the bugs. listen to this. what expert has found a way to hack into users' acts on the obama care website. find out how and who could be at risk. the american dream is of a better future, a confident retirement. those dreams, there's just no way we're going to let them die. ♪
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top of the hour. i'm brooke baldwin. we may never know why the nsa is tapping the phones of some of america's closest allies or even how extensive u.s. spying really is. but you're looking at these men. they know. today the head of the nsa and the president's top intelligence chief were talking. they have been grilled on the question everyone wants to know. did the president know? >> would it be fair to say that the white house should know what those collection priorities are? >> they can and do, but i have to say that, that does not necessarily extend down to the level of detail. we're talking about a huge enterprise here with thousands and thousands of individual requirements. so we don't necessarily review with the white house what the forthcoming collection deck is, say, for overhead collection for tomorrow or which asset is recruiting which source or in the case of nsa, which selector
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is being used to fulfill specific requirements. that is done at levels below the white house or the national security staff. >> this congressional hearing happening in washington, this all comes as the chair of the senate intelligence committee, senator diane feinstein, who has been a loyal defender of the nsa, she broke ranks. she's now said they've been kept in the dark about just what the nsa was up to, demanding a total surveillance review. the president, while not admitting or denying anything, he is trying to calm this diplomatic storm with the promise of this review. joining me now, mike baker, former cia covert operations officer. he's also the host of the new show "americans declassified," premiering this weekend. mike, welcome back. nice to see you. >> thank you very much. >> diane feinstein says the u.s. should not be snooping on its allies. but this is what james clapper said today. >> it's one of the first things i learned in intel school, 1963.
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this is a fundamental given in the intelligence business. leadership intentions, no matter what level you're talking about, that can be military leaders as well. >> do you believe the allies have conducted or at any time any type of espionage activity against the united states of america, our intelligence services, our leaders or otherwise? >> absolutely. >> so i thought that was pretty interesting, mike. i wanted to ask you about that. since you know about the intel community, have there always been -- how would you react to this notion of maybe tensions between the intelligence community and the administration? >> well, this has been going on forever. some people refer to it as the oldest profession, if not the second oldest. so the idea somehow that france and germany and spain are outraged over this, but at the same time, frankly, are doing the same thing. every country to the degree that their resources allow, they're spying on their friends, their neighbors, their allies, as well
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as their enemies, of course. it was interesting to hear james clapper during this hearing kind of work around the issue of exactly how much the president is aware of in this program. clapper is right that the president's not going to know the day-to-day goings on of nsa. of course not. >> so you believe that? let me just jump in. do you buy the fact the president said he did not know? >> absolutely not. >> yeah, yeah. >> nor do i believe diane feinstein saying the same thing. she's saying for ten years this was going on and i'm shocked and outraged and i didn't know. wait a minute. look at her position. that just means she's the least curious person along with the president that we have working in washington. i don't understand why they would go this route. >> so that said, do you think that the tapping of u.s. allies' personal cell phones of world leade leaders, is that fair game? is that necessary? >> well, it would be pure
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speculation for me to say whether it's necessary at any particular moment. >> just knowing what you've ever known. >> right. you know what, honestly, i understand the reason for the collection effort. i do worry that there are times when we're not looking at it from necessarily a particular operational perspective. what i mean by that is i understand why we have collection programs that have the wide parameters that allow us if necessary to do that. but what i'm worried about is just like any other collection program, particularly when you were talking about technical collection, is that we want to make sure we're doing it for an operational purpose, not just because we can. not just because we can put all this material in a box, set it in the basement and hope some day we're going to need it. i'm more concerned from a tactical and operational perspective, that we're doing it for the right reasons. >> great point. this is from christopher dicky. he wrote this. in fact, there was something terribly cyclical and dangerous about the ebb and flow of intelligence community abuses and public reactions over the
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years. the spooks overreach, the public overreacts, and what should be the reasonable business of spying gets vilified and cut back until one day disaster strikes and the public wonders why nobody warned us. yes, think 9/11. does he have a point? >> he does have a point. things always happen in cycles. typically there's this outrage. frankly, the european allies are playing to their public. there's a bit of theater involved in all of this. now that it's out in the spotlight, you know, they need to come out there and say, we are shocked, we are outraged. but typically, there will be an incident like this, and now if the white house does follow through and senator feinstein follows through on their claim they're going to restrict practices, that essentially they're going to write laws that narrow the parameters where our u.s. intel community works, then what they're really saying is we're making national security decisions for political theater reasons. i think that's a very dangerous course of action. >> mike baker, appreciate you. thank you very much.
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>> thank you. first, a formal apology and a vow to make things right. that's what we with heard today from the woman whose agency oversaw the creation of healthcare.gov, the website for obama care. she is marilyn tavenner. she would not reveal how many people have been able to sign up for coverage so far. no numbers yet. repeatedly saying those figures won't be able until next month. but she said she is well aware of the problems with the site and those problems will be fixed as soon as possible. >> some have had trouble creating accounts and logging into the site while others have received confusing error messages or had to wait slow response times. this initial experience has not lived up to our expectations or the expectations of the american people and it is not acceptable. >> speaking of not acceptable, cnn money has now learned that a cyber security expert found a way to hack into users' accou
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accounts, found a way to hack into healthcare.gov. he says it wasn't even that hard. allis allison kosik with he in new york. >> as if the obama care website didn't have enough problems already. a software tester in arizona figured out a way to hack into users' accounts. all you have to do is guess an existing user name and the website will confirm it exists, claiming you forgot your password and the site will reset it for you. you can even view the site's unencrypted browser. the website displays three security questions. answer the security questions wrong, and guess what? the website spits out the account owner's e-mail address. sounds complicated. but when someone with the most basic understanding of website coding could figure this out,
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it's a problem. >> but here's the silver lining. according to our reporting that, problem has been fixed, yes? >> yes, it has. by friday, all of these problems were solved. social security numbers and health information were not at risk. but people's addresses and phone numbers were potentially exposed for three weeks. it was so easy to hack into the information in the first place. in fact, he said this really seemed sloppy. he says when he tried to report it to an obama care hotline operator, they referred him to law enforcement, which he said wasn't very helpful either. >> alison kosik, thank you. stick with me. in 20 minutes, we're going to talk to someone else and take a closer look at the troubles continually plaguing this website and the administration in general and how president obama has handled all this criticism. stay tuned for that. coming up next, this frightening story out of colorado. a young girl in her bedroom snatched in the middle of the night. police say a man cut the screen off her bedroom window, climbed into the house, but then the story takes a whole other twist.
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we'll explain how the girl was able to get away. plus, a chilling murder mystery for los angeles. human remains found in two waste treatment plants. police are working to identify them and figure out how they got there.
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a disturbing find at a los angeles county water treatment facility. a woman's upper torso discovered inside this sewage storage tank. the sheriffs department believes the discovery is related to the remains that were found saturday in a water treatment plant just about 30 miles away. a spokesman tells cnn affiliate kcal that the only way for someone to actually get into
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this system is through a manhole cover or a sewer line. >> anything coming into this plant comes in through a 72-inch line and goes through a sen trif call pump. so you can imagine, you know, what kind of damage to a large -- or a person's body would happen going through a pump. >> this doesn't have the appearance of an accident. people don't just fall in a manhole cover. >> we're treating it as a homicide right now, but there's a lot of information that has to be unearthed to determine the actual cause of death and what's behind it. >> police are working to figure out whether the two sets of remains belong to the same person. they're also asking for anyone with information about a missing woman to call police. and this is one of the boldest attempted kidnappings colorado investigators say they have ever seen. this 8-year-old girl found the
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courage to break away, to scream, to fight from her captor who police say grabbed her in the middle of the night, snatched her from her bedroom right through the window. this happened monday in aurora. you see what's left of the screen from the window. police say the child kicked and screamed until she escaped and could run back home. now this all-out man hunt is underway. this is the man, here's a sketch, take a look, from police. they want this guy. they're offering $10,000 for his capture. that's the largest reward in the history of the aurora police department. mike brooks, law enforcement analyst, she did the right thing. >> she absolutely did the right thing. it probably saved her life, brooke. i think about the case in georgia we had not too long ago at a walmart where a little girl was snatched by a stranger. she hollered and kicked and screamed and it saved her life. same thing happened here. >> what about -- i know these forensically trained investigators have obviously been questioning this 8-year-old girl.
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how do you -- what kind of questions do you ask? >> well, they usually bring in someone who specializes in dealing with children. you know, it looks like she probably had maybe talked to her parents about if something like this happened. they were able at least to get a composite drawing of a white male with short blond hair. they believe he was driving a late model bmw, either silver or gray in color. this happened right around 16th and hanover. that's right off one of the main drags, colfax after, that runs through aurora into denver. so there's a lot of businesses around there. i guarantee you the investigators are combing, looking for surveillance video from those businesses. >> so they want to know who, they want to find this guy. i was reading on "the denver post" that this girl's grandmother said she was sitting in her bed, doing homework. at the time, there was another child who was asleep in this room. this grandmother said this man grabbed her and said, i know your family, but police are treating this as a stranger
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kidnapping, which is pretty rare. >> it is because -- but one of the things law enforcement does, they talk to the parents, they want to make sure no one in the family had anything to do with this so they can move on with other parts of the investigation. they want to totally clear them. but they think this was a total stranger abduction, that there's a predator out there somewhere. >> that was watching her? >> there's a possibility. i don't know if she takes a bus to or from school. we hear about this happening all around the country all the time. in fact, they were sending notices out to the schools in the aurora area with the description, with the composite, letting parents know that there's this guy out there and is wanted. >> aurora is on it. hope they get him. mike, thank you. >> absolutely. police in oklahoma are desperately searching for two inmates who escaped through the ceiling in shower of a county jail. two others have been captured. these are the guys right here. after being spotted by
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investigators as they were walking to a convenience store, the sheriffs office says both men appeared very wet and very dirty and were less than 20 miles from that jail. the store clerk described the arrest. >> these two guys came in. we had never seen them before. we just kind of watched them, make sure they weren't stealing anything. they paid for their stuff. they walked outside. the cops, like about ten of them, drove up here. that one just stopped. they put him in the car. the other one ran down the alley. the cop got him. that was pretty much it. >> here are the two men who remain at large. they're considered armed and dangerous. $60 billion in damage, more than 100 people killed. today marks one year since hurricane sandy came ashore and wreaked havoc on the northeast. they're still picking up the pieces and rebuilding but vowing not to give up.
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>> we're not going any place. we're going to give it at least another shot. >> coming up next, we have an update for you on those rebuilding efforts and a look back one year ago at that devastating day. and the white house under fire. the president facing criticism on a number of issues from health care to spying. has president obama done enough to answer critics? we'll talk about that coming up. , just by talking to a helmet. it grabbed the patient's record before we even picked him up. it found out the doctor we needed was at st. anne's. wiggle your toes. [ driver ] and it got his okay on treatment from miles away. it even pulled strings with the stoplights. my ambulance talks with smoke alarms and pilots and stadiums. but, of course, it's a good listener too. [ female announcer ] today cisco is connecting the internet of everything. so everything works like never before. ♪
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♪ ♪ maestro of project management. baron of the build-out. you need a permit... to be this awesome. and you...rent from national. because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle... and go. you can even take a full-size or above, and still pay the mid-size price. (aaron) purrrfect. (vo) meee-ow, business pro. meee-ow. go national. go like a pro. was a truly amazing day.ey, without angie's list, i don't know if we could have found all the services we needed for our riley. from contractors and doctors to dog sitters and landscapers. you can find it all on angie's list. join today.
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some positive news for homeowners to pass along to you. home prices made their largest annual gain since the days of the housing bubble. for the month of august, the kay shiller home price index rising from 12.8%. that's the biggest gain since february of 2006. despite the rebound, though, overall home prices are still about 20% below their peak in july of 2006. and now those images from last year's devastatingly, deadly superstorm sandy remain all too fresh on the mind of many americans, especially those survivors who are still recovering, still reeling from the aftermath. i mean, few will forget the massive flooding that followed when the powerful hurricane slammed into the northeast. few places around new york city and new jersey were spared.
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thousands were displaced. and people who today are trying to rebuild, they're dealing with another kind of storm, getting help from fema. costly flood insurance mandates are preventing some folks from getting loans they so desperately need to fix their homes. cnn takes a look back at the coverage that day and the lasting imprint left by the storm. >> sandy is 1,000 miles wide, packing gail force winds. >> the second largest tropical system we've seen in the last few decades. >> there's no extra room here. >> we're telling folks here, it's going to have the seas of a nor'easter and the winds of a hurricane. >> the surf continues to pour in. this is an area that should not see this water this high up. >> mayor bloomberg said, in fact, the crane structures and all these sites have been examined. >> more breaking news right now. we are learning -- look at these pictures with me. this is a partial crane collapse in new york city. >> it's really blowing in
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atlantic city. it's one of those gusts we're getting. it wasn't this way for the whole last couple of hours. >> right now we have horizontal rain and wind and sand, brooke. this is the other problem with these coastal communities. if you look at the boardwalk right here -- >> i can tell you now the water behind me in it the hudson river soon is going to crest over where we are right now. >> it has now made landfall not that far from cape may courthouse in southern new jersey. >> so the whole north side of my town is totally under water. >> we're now at about, i would say, 6 to 8 inches. i told you about five minutes ago we were at 4. >> five minutes ago i was able to walk to the boardwalk, which is about two blocks from where we are now. it's now impossible to get over there. >> things are not good at all in hoboken right now. unfortunately, the hudson river has breached our city. >> you see flashes of light behind me. it's not lightning. >> breaking news. extraordinary pictures of a con ed plant explosion. this is on the lower east side
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of manhattan, new york. you can see a dramatic picture of a transformer exploding at that con ed plant. >> power is out. that's a pretty incredible thing. power is out in lower manhattan. >> the seawater is rushing into the battery tunnel. i don't know the extent of it. >> you can see the shine at the bottom. that bottom shine is the water that's now filling the tunnel. >> i want to show you a picture of a hoboken, i believe it's the subway stop train station. new images, a house fire in rockaway, queens. >> 50 homes already burnt to the ground. >> the alley ways between the homes are actually quite thin, so the trucks couldn't get to the home where the fire first started. >> a 700-ton tanker has run aground on front street in staten island. >> three towns have just been devastated. >> they're not even exactly sure why this happened. this is not a zone that sees
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this type of flooding. >> it's devastating. it's absolutely devastating. we're just at the beginning of the tour down the rest of the coast. you know, we saw scenes like this earlier today by video. seeing it in person on the ground is a whole different thing. >> just one year ago. the white house on the defensive today. officials taking some pretty tough questions from congress on obama care and the united states spying policy. president obama has said he did not know about some of the specific details for each. is that response enough, or should he take full responsibility? we're going to discuss that next. you're watching cnn.
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bottom of the hour, i'm brooke baldwin. i want to talk about the white house because two key white house policies hitting some rough waters in recent days. first, you have the administration having to explain intelligence gathering
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operations that ensnared world leaders here. number two, they have to defend the merits of the president's health care law. today the woman whose agency oversaw the creation of the obama care website said, i'm sorry. marilyn tavenner apologized at a congressional hearing this morning. but when asked how many people have managed to sign up for coverage thus far, she said everyone just has to wait to get that tangible number. >> we will not have those numbers available until mid-november. we will have those numbers mid-november. >> are you getting those numbers? >> am i getting those numbers? not yet. >> you have no numbers on who's enrolled? so you have no idea? >> we'll have those numbers available mid-november. >> how do you not know how many people have enrolled? >> chairman camp, we'll have nose numbers available mid-november. >> you may not know her name or her face, marilyn tavenner, but
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y you know her boss, kathleen sebelius. tomorrow is her turn to answer questions from lawmakers. a number of lawmakers have called for sebelius to be fired. meanwhile, the white house is also dealing with the aftershocks of the nsa spying revelations in which world leaders, including allies like germany's chancellor angela merkel, they're angry over word that the use eavesdropped on their private conversations. let's talk about this, the bigger picture here. the policies, the criticisms. bob cusack joins me from washington. he's the managing editor of "the hill." bob, great to see you back here. >> hey, brooke. >> let's begin with -- listen, working at the white house, it's a tough job. but we have heard the criticism that this administration, you know, maybe good at creating policies, never really good at executing policies. we've heard that before.
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do you think what we're watching today sort of gives legitimacy to that criticism? >> well, brooke, i mean, when the president's going against somebody like a boogie man on the right, whether it's mitt romney or house republicans during the shutdown, he's done very well. but in these other situations, i mean, this is a gift to the republicans who are basically saying, what shutdown? they're focusing on obama care, the nsa controversy. it's a tough position for president obama and his team, but i think there are parallels in both the nsa issue as well as the obama care website. they have to release more information. it continues to be a story if they don't release the enrollment numbers. i mean, clearly, if those numbers were good, they would be out. they keep saying mid-november. >> not until november, right? that's what we just heard from her this morning. we also heard, you know, that obama did not know about spying on allies. we heard obama did not know the health care website was such a mess. is i don't know really an
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acceptable defense? because at some point, you know, just speaking optically, don't you start to be perceived as out of touch? >> yeah, and previously obama hasn't taken this stance. he said on a number of occasions the buck stops with me, whether it's benghazi or other issues that he had in the first term. so i don't think that's a good long-term strategy. any time you're having that discussion of i didn't know about it or if i knew about it, either way, it's bad news for the white house. but i think they have to be less reactive and go on offense and lead the charge on changing the nsa, curbing their powers, doing whatever they think is best. now you have allies, as you mentioned before, diane feinstein working on legislation. you have friends on capitol hill. once again, this divides the democratic party. we saw the republicans divided during the fiscal showdown. democrats are now grappling with both the health care issue and the nsa issue. >> my, what a difference two weeks makes. speaking of capitol hill, i want to pause and dip back into this congressional hearing underway.
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we're watching some very important people here being questioned. here's congresswoman michelle bachman. let's listen. >> -- or any of our other wonderful ally. it's reasonable to believe they either historically have or currently are listening to the united states or our leaders? >> that's correct. >> is it common for those who are not united states allies, whether it's russia or china or iran, would it be reasonable to conclude they listen to the united states or our leaders? >> it's reasonable to assume that, yes. >> and has that information been made available to the white house? >> yes. >> has it been made available to the president of the united states? and does the white house get national security briefings from the nsa? >> well, the nsa is one of the contributors to the briefings that are given in the white house. >> and how often are those briefings given to the white house? >> virtually daily.
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>> virtually daily. how often -- if it's given daily, how often does the president of the united states attend those briefings? if you could speak into the microphone. >> he is briefed either here or if he's on the road. >> does the president -- how often does the president attend those briefings? does he receive them personally? >> quite frequently. >> quite frequently. in his absence, which members receive those briefings? >> well, the rest of the national security apparatus, the vice president, and the cabinet heads all receive variations, but essentially the same briefing. >> and so would the national security council staff or the white house who deals with the country in question be made aware if there was any listening going on? would the national security council staffer at the white house who deals with the country
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in question be aware if there's any listening going on? >> as a general response, yes. it depends on the responsibility in the nss. >> and if the united states was doing any listening of key foreign leaders -- we learned this week that apparently was news to the white house. would that information have been made available to the white house and their briefing books? >> as i explained earlier on the way the national intelligence priority framework works and the way the broad national tasking is implemented or executed throughout each of the collection disciplines, it's unlikely and unrealistic to think that every last detail about how a particular piece of information is gleaned through all the collection apparatus we have, it would not necessarily know that level of detail.
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>> so let me ask you this. was the leaker in question, ed snowden, was he a traitor? >> you're asking me? >> yes. >> absolutely. >> would that be the opinion also of general alexander? is that your opinion? >> absolutely. >> mr. engliss? >> yes, ma'am. >> and mr. cole? >> he's been charged not with treason but certainly leaking and compromising the integrity of our intelligence system. >> in your opinion, mr. cole, would he be considered a traitor to the united states? >> this is a matter that's -- >> just your personal opinion. >> unfortunately as a justice department official where there's a case involved, it's difficult for me to do that under the rules of professional responsibility. >> does the white house consider mr. snowden a traitor? >> i think best to ask -- you say the white house collectively. i think most people feel that he's done a great disservice to the country. >> i yield back. >> could i just make sure -- i want to make sure i answered all
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the snowden thing. i answered them quick. if i could just ask the deputy attorney general just to make sure i hit those all right. you have some constitutional questions. i'm not a lawyer. i want to make sure i got that correct. >> i think the only one i might add to is certain foreigners who are in the united states do have certain constitutional rights. that would be the only amendment i'd make to what general alexander said. >> perhaps he could elaborate back -- >> a little back and forth. they're asking questions of james clapper and general keith alexander, head of the nsa and also the head of national intelligence. so a couple questions back and forth. bob, let me bring you back in. part of the questioning clearly about the crux of this is what did the president know, how much did the president know. you could hear congresswoman bachman asking about those briefings. was the president in attendance? who was there if he wasn't? what did you make of that back and forth? >> i think they were pretty good questions by congresswoman
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bachman. there were a lot of questions that remain here. i think the administration, and you saw it with james clapper today, is starting to say, listen, everyone spies here. the problem is you can't get caught. somewhere in russia edward snowden is smiling right now, coming up in congressional testimony like we've heard. so this has really thrown off the -- thrown the white house off balance. at first, the president was saying the nsa is not spying on americans. now they've have to deal with spying on foreign leaders. that's been the big problem. >> okay. bob cusack, thank you very much. coming up next, the cnn film "blackfish" has sparked a nationwide debate over what should be done with killer whales in captivity. there's been a huge push to set the whales free. the big question is, once the whales are released back into the ocean, what happens next? we investigate that after the break. it's a growing trend in business: do more with less with less energy. hp is helping ups do just that. soon, the world's most intelligent servers,
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whales in captivity. many opponents of aquariums and marine parks would like to see the killer whales set free, but how can that be done? the other question, once they're set free, what next? cnn's martin savage has been looking into just that question. martin? >> brooke, there's no question that the movie "blackfish" has stirred up a lot of controversy and has some people rethinking this whole idea of captivity for killer whales. but then what do you do? in other words, can you just set them free? as we found out, it is not that simple. there are 45 to 50 captive killer whales around the world. colin was involved in the only effort to attempt a performing killer whale back into the wild. the star of the movie "free willy." he survives just over a year after swimming off on his own.
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but he says he wasn't the best candida candidate. >> what is the measure by which you determine who's a good candidate and who's not? >> length of capture, aim of capture. >> most of the acaptured killer whales died off. most we see today were born in a pool. they've never had to hunt for their own food and never even seen an ocean. marine zooologist anna hall says these hybrid killer whales would never fit in with the wild ones and could be a danger by transmitting human illnesses to wild populations. >> you've got an malls that have come in contact with humans. have they got disease? >> so is there an alternative to keeping them in tanks? to find out, i'm in a boat in victoria, british columbia, looking for ocean front real estate for a retirement home for killer whales. i brought you here because i wanted to give you an example. this is it. a bay with a net that would be strung across the entrance so
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that the killer whales could be on one side, protected and cared for. and then all around them, they'd be in a living ocean. the idea is called a sea pen. >> natural seawater bringing in fish and, you know, the bird and everything else with it. just a natural pristine environment for a retired captive orca. >> but where does the money come from for the land, the food, and the constant human care? from the public who would pay to visit, say supporters. paul boyle of the association of zoos and aquariums think they'd be disappointed. >> people can't see them. they won't see them. they won't know about them. they will lose the compelling reason for protecting the oceans and the environment around us. so i guess i'd just say what's the point of that? >> the point, says anna hall, is that it would be far better than
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the cement pond where most captive killer whales live today. >> we can put people on the moon. we can do a sea pen. we just need to think about it a little bit. >> as popular as that idea is for a sea penammals, we looked everywhere in the world to try to find one functioning today. there is not a single one. right now it is just an idea. brooke? >> martin savage, thank you. it could be the most important moment in the murder trial of this utah doctor. today the jury saw statements made by his now 12-year-old daughter. she was just 6 when she found her mother's body in a bathtub. coming up next, what this little girl said and how it'll impact the trial. at coca-cola we believe in giving people choices. especially today, as people are looking for more low, and no calorie options. that's why on vending machines, we're making it easy for people to know how many calories
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jurors heard from someone who is expected to be one of the more powerful witnesses in the trial of this accused wife killer, his youngest daughter ada was all of 6 years young when she found the body of michelle mcneill in the bathtub back in 2007. prosecutors say martin mcneill killed his wife so he could be with another woman. the jury, though, is not hearing from ada on the stand, but rather on this video, watching this interview she gave in 2008 to a county investigator. only the audio is being released publicly. here it is. >> it was just, like, water. >> just like water? >> just a different color.
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>> okay. >> she was just laying down. >> she was laying down in the bathtub? did she still have her blue jacket on? and some kind of pants. what was your dad doing in the quick help. go next door and get somebody. >> jane velez-mitchell joins me now. to hear this little girl's voice, it is heartbreaking and talking about her mom in this bathtub and at the time when she gave the interview, correct me, she was 7. how much will this really impact this case? >> first of all, i agree with you. absolutely heart wrenching to hear this little girl in her baby voice say repeatedly, wry want to talk about it. i don't want to talk about it. she didn't want to talk about this. this was so traumatizing for her to remember. ultimately, as she is questioned gently, she does remember seeing
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mommy lying down in the tub face-up. looking up fully clothed. now that is completely different than what dr. mcneil said. he claimed that he found his wife face down in the tub as if she had tripped and fallen over with her head in the tub and legs out of the tub which would lean more towards accidental death. the way the water describes it, it would lead more towards possibly murder. it is very crucial difference but ultimately you have a 7-year-old testifyinging on videotape, audiotape, about what she remember as year earlier. it is not that credible. very, very emotional. but not that credible. that's why ultimately the defense said we are not even going to try to cross-examine the now 12-year-old girl this is day who is now 12. let's talk about the mistress. or i should say ex-mistress. gypsy willis. let me tell you some of this. this is part of her testimony.
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this is when she talks about martin trying to get a fake i.d. for her. here she was. >> what name was used for you? >> jillian g. macneill. >> did you hold yourself out as married to someone? >> yes. >> married to whom? >> martin macneill. >> did you have a marriage day on this? >> marriage date is listed as april 14. >> of what what we are? >> 2007. >> what's the significantrence of april 14, 2007? >> that is the day of the funeral. >> of whose funeral? >> michele's. >> how did she do? >> she did great. i believe that she may still very well be in love with the defendant and hoping that he gets acquitted so they can hook up again after this trial. because she was -- it appears -- doing everything she could to help the defendant to the point where the prosecution said, your honor, this is a hostile witness for the prosecution.
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it is really fascinating. i think the very thing that made her sort of irresistible to dr. macneill was the same thing t t that -- nothing, yeah. the day of the funeral. no big deal. we said we were married on that day. next question. i think we needed a little i want martinez. remember the prosecution in the jodi arias case that was attacking the witness. that's what i think the prosecution needed to do here. they kind of let her slide. there were very incriminating things she said but they didn't bring it home. i think that there could have been a little bit more theatrics on the part of the prosecution now. again, all of this very creepy and they -- she -- dr. macneill a sexy photo of her but toks day after michele died. they were shopping and bidding for wedding rings on ebay. he proposes to her within a couple of months of michele's death and gives hear 4 1/2-carat
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ring worth about $7 thousand. she said very, very creepy bp what's it prove? they were having an affair. where is the leap towards murder? that's where the prosecution has a problem. >> i got it. >> jane velez-mitchell, thank you very much. watch jane each and every night. 7:00 p.m. eastern on our sister station, hln. coming up next, day's best videos. including a guy who dodge ad bullet because of his cell phone. mine was earned orbiting the moon in 1971. afghanistan in 2009. on the u.s.s. saratoga in 1982. [ male announcer ] once it's earned, usaa auto insurance is often handed down from generation to generation because it offers a superior level of protection and because usaa's commitment to serve current and former military members and their families is without equal. begin your legacy. get an auto insurance quote. usaa. we know what it means to serve.
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time for the hottest videos of the day. hit play. up first, saved by the cell. a florida gas station clerk is lucky to be live today after his cell phone stopped a bull fret a would-be robber. when the clerk couldn't open the safe, the robber fired one shot as he was leave. >> clerk said, i feel like my chest hurts.
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that's when they realized the guy shot at him and hit him, struck his cell phone and cell phone stopped the bull set the clerk was checked out at the hospital and released. the suspect, still on the run. feeling a little stressed? maybe a massage from a python will help you loosen up a bit. a spa in indonesia is offering the treatment. they say the movement of the snakes and the fear you feel help out your metabolism. go figure. it was the one that got away. a couple of fishermen showing off their catch of the day when out of nowhere this sea lion sneaks up and yanks the mahi mahi out of his hands. you snooze, you lose. "star wars" pans, take note. it happened long ago in a galaxy far, far away, 36 years to be
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precise. fans are finally getting a look online at a never-before-seen "star wars" blooper reel. >> let's get some distance. >> how do you pronounce it? >> that's today's "hit pray." "hit play." i leave you with news. sorry to be the bearer of this. the jonas brothers, breaking up. ♪ ♪ can't hold myself back >> they canceled their tour three weeks ago over creative differences. "people" magazine quoted their spokesman as saying there was a
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deep rift between the musical direction. the pop band of brothers is splitting up for good and going their separate ways. have you missed an interview you want to check out go the brooke log at cnn.com. that's it for me. see you tomorrow. to washington we go. "the lead with jake tapper" starts right now. if president obama likes his current spying program can he keep his current spying program? i'm jake tapper. this is "the lead." national lead. president's top intelligence men on capitol hill now facing questions about why the nsa is tapping the phones of some of our closest allies. what exactly the president knew about it. will the nsa have to put an end to it? national news, we heard this over and over. if you like your health plan you can keep your health plan. now thousands of americans are finding out that's not true. including our guest, former democratic congressional staffer that has been an enthusiastic proponent of obama care. sh